1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a center airbag for a vehicle, which is provided on a roof panel between a front seat and a rear seat so as to protect a passenger sitting in the rear seat in the event of a vehicle collision.
2. Description of Related Art
Generally, a vehicle is equipped with a safety device to safely protect a passenger from an accident, such as a collision or overturning. A safety belt for restraining the body of a passenger and an airbag for relieving shocks generated when a passenger collides with a vehicular body are used as the safety device. The airbag is installed as necessary at various portions of a vehicle, and includes a driver seat airbag that is installed in a steering wheel, and a passenger seat airbag that is installed in an instrument panel of a passenger seat.
As for a common car in FIG. 1, a front space 2 in which a passenger 1 of a front seat is present and a rear space 4 in which a passenger 3 of a rear seat is present are formed into a single integrated space. Due to such a configuration, when a vehicle collision occurs when the passenger 3 of the rear seat does not wear a safety belt, the passenger 3 of the rear seat is moved to the front of the vehicle by inertial force, so that passengers in the vehicle may undesirably collide with each other. In addition, the movement of baggage from the rear seat to the front causes a collision between the passenger and the baggage, thus resulting in serious damage.
In order to solve the problem, a conventional airbag apparatus capable of separating the front space from the rear space has been proposed. However, the conventional airbag apparatus is problematic in that it may be deployed to the front of the vehicle and caught by the front seat, so that the airbag apparatus cannot be deployed completely, or it may be deployed to the rear of the vehicle and caught by the passenger of the rear seat, so that the airbag apparatus cannot be deployed completely.
Moreover, even when the airbag is deployed, it is deployed unstably, thus causing an undesirable movement of the airbag. Therefore, it takes a long time to stabilize the airbag after being fully deployed.
The information disclosed in this Background of the Invention section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.